Somali-American who helped Mogadishu govt killed

MOGADISHU, Somalia (AP) — Gunmen shot and killed a Somali-American from Minnesota who had left a well-paying job in the U.S. to help the fledgling city government in Mogadishu, an official and relative said Wednesday.

Abdullahi Ali Anshur, 60, was an engineer helping the Mogadishu government with urban planning and drainage systems. He was killed after armed militants from the Islamic extremist group al-Shabab stopped his vehicle and sprayed it with bullets on Monday, police Capt. Mohamed Hussein said.

Anshur was buried in Mogadishu on Wednesday. He had left his work in Minnesota to help Mogadishu's municipal government, said a relative who insisted on anonymity for security reasons. Anshur had held a similar job in Mogadishu more than two decades ago before the Somali government collapsed in the early 1990s.

This photo taken Sunday, Sept. 29, 2013 and provided by the family of Abdullahi Ali Anshur, 60, shows the Somali-American from Minnesota at his office in Mogadishu, Somalia. Gunmen shot and killed Abdullahi Ali Anshur, an engineer from Minnesota who had left a well-paying job in the U.S to help the fledgling Mogadishu city government with urban planning and drainage systems, a Somali official and relative said Wednesday, Nov. 19, 2014. (AP Photo/Family of Abdullahi Ali Anshur)

Many Somalis who fled the country's chaos for the U.S. and Europe have recently returned to Mogadishu to use their expertise to help the country move past decades of war and Anshur's killing has sent shock waves through that community. One British-Somali man who returned to Mogadishu to open a cafe called Anshur's death discouraging.

"Insecurity is the biggest threat for now," said Ahmed Mohamed.

A Somali-American in Mogadishu, Hussein Ali, said such attacks leave U.S. and European Somalis scared and disappointed. "It makes many of us contemplate leaving Mogadishu," he said.

Anshur was a graduate of California State University and UCLA. He had arrived in Mogadishu last year, his relative said.

Al-Shabab, an ultra-conservative Islamic militant group that wants to run Somalia by its strict interpretation of Shariah law, once ruled nearly all of Mogadishu. The group was forced out of the capital in 2011 but continues to carry out insurgent attacks and targeted murders.

In a separate incident, armed assailants shot and killed a freelance journalist in the central Somali town of Galkayo on Tuesday evening. Three journalists have been murdered in targeted killings this year, according to the National Union of Somali Journalists, which condemned the shooting. Journalists face attacks by al-Shabab, government figures and powerful businessmen, the group said.

Omar Jamal, a longtime advocate for Minnesota's Somali community, said Anshur was his mentor and the two often met for coffee in the mornings. He described Anshur as a well-educated and gentle person.

"He had a bigger view in life," Jamal said. "He was very strongly against terrorism, very strongly against al-Shabab. He was a very nationalistic, loving human being."

This photo taken Wednesday, June 4, 2014, and provided by the family of Abdullahi Ali Anshur, 60, shows the Somali-American from Minnesota in Istanbul, Turkey. Gunmen shot and killed Abdullahi Ali Anshur, an engineer from Minnesota who had left a well-paying job in the U.S to help the fledgling Mogadishu city government with urban planning and drainage systems, a Somali official and relative said Wednesday, Nov. 19, 2014. (AP Photo/Family of Abdullahi Ali Anshur)